Chapter 2: Found Part 2

However, following introductions with over a dozen more of Haile’s toys, I have deduced that the only explanation is a state of permanent delirium.

Surely not all of these things can be home to a being of my nature?

Though, I suppose there would be no way to confirm or deny our existence to each other…

“Haile, popcorn is ready!” shouts up Jackie from the lower level.

Haile hollers back, “Coming!”

“I’ll be back up soon, Bin-Ling.”

“I promise not to fall asleep so we can have a welcome, and farewell party for you” states Haile with firm confidence.

She prances away from me to the stairwell to stride raucously down the steps.

I would rather heaven’s judgement spite me now over spending another moment partaking in your insufferable endeavours!

Humans truly are pestering vermin.

I do not know where this raging inferno of endless hatred for humans stems from, likely from the being presumed to be a human who sealed me in this eternal prison, but this feeling has always been ingrained in my soul.

If I possess one.

As I continue to stare at Haile’s toys ahead of me, lined in a row next to where she had conducted introductions, the faint noise of unfamiliar voices, mystical sounds, and an occasional symphony of bliss, echo from the lower level.

The voices of Jackie, Haile, and the man have not been heard in some time, besides occasional giggling or bursts of laughter from Haile.

Suddenly, the array of sound ceases, replaced by whispers that I cannot understand between Jackie and the man.

The sound of careful footsteps draws closer until someone climbing the staircase is heard and I see the man cradling Haile in his arm.

Her head rests against his shoulder with closed eyes.

Jackie follows closely behind.

The two of them enter the adjacent room and exit without Haile.

Peering back to the room, Jackie murmurs, “Goodnight, sweetheart”, closing the door a moment later.

A muffled and lumbering yawn sprung from the man, matched a moment later by the same involuntary reflex bellowing from Jackie.

This time of day is typically when the bodies of humans require a soundless slumber through the night.

I do not require sleep.

Long ago, I had spent moon, after moon, after moon with my eyes closed in an attempt to find sleep to no avail.

Fatigue is not something that encumbers me, even if I could physically move, but sleep would allow for my consciousness to settle and my existence to go by faster.

Faster to what?

I am not sure.

Turning his focus toward the room I am seated in, the man shakes his head loosely while he methodically rubs his finger against his weary eyes.

He approaches to grab a winding cylinder of purple and pink that stretches down to the floor once the upper half is held in his hand.

His eyes search the area a moment before they fall upon me.

Yes…

His knees strenuously crack as he bends down to reach for my flattened cone lid.

He lifts my lid, stores the slinking toy within my shadowed enclosure, and places the lid back on once the object is situated to his liking.

Schwoop!

No audible noise is heard, but once my lid smothers the secured object of bright colors in ineludible blackness, I can feel…

I piece of myself imbued, becoming one with me until it is expelled.

Apart from the springy object he grabbed initially, the man eyes the other toys with the intention of further tidying the area by filling my storage.

More!

More!

Jackie gestures to the corridor leading away from the room Haile occupies.

“Chase, why don’t we let Haile take care of this in the morning and head to bed”, she suggests.

Chase replies, “You’re right.”

“I don’t want to wake her.”

“But I’m going to do a little bit more work on my presentation”, he finishes, lathered with a bitter regret.

“If all goes well, I’ll be offered a contract extension at least.”

Chase…

Chase walks to the top of the steps, presumably to leave Jackie to go to their bed without him.

Before Chase can walk past Jackie, she lurches to catch his hand in hers, intertwining their fingers.

Jackie's eyes shift shakily between Chase and anywhere but him.

Her shoulders and head slump as an elongated exhale is blown from her parted lips.

“I’m sorry. For early today, I mean. I know there’s a lot of pressure on you, and I shouldn’t…”

Now that the only perceptible aspect of my existence is fulfilled, their babble bores me.

They talk for a brief moment, both sustaining a supportive and warm tone, before they tightly embrace one another and they part with a tender kiss.

“I’ll be out here for a few minutes, but then I’ll come to bed”, says Chase.

“Sounds good, honey. Love you.’

“Love you, too.”

They split at the stairwell, Chase tiptoes down the steps, and Jackie smoothly through the corridor where a door is closed once she is out of my sight.

Love.

As foreign to me as a fish is to a bird’s soaring.

I am sure I was once capable of such an emotion, but my capacity for it has long since ceased.

…Now that I am linked to Haile, Jackie, and Chase, I cannot help but wonder, for the first time in centuries when a sensation apart from the succulence of malice came to me.

Who were my elders?

Did I ‘love’ them?

Chase appears again, this time holding a slim sheet of metal cut in the shape of a flat box, and drops into the chair located in the corner of the room.

He pries open the object to cast a luminous light of white that brightens his face.

With hands rested on the flattened half of the object on his lap, a harmonious clicking begins as his fingers twitch rapidly.

This flow of clicking is broken by the occasional rugged sigh, tender rub of his face, or thoughtful examination of his fidgeting hands as if he expects to find an answer to something.

After observing him repeat these movements for longer than Jackie would have accepted, he lays the square slab down on the pedestal next to his chair.

He sets his eyes aimlessly on the ceiling as his head droops to rest on the pillowed chair-back.

“Even I don’t like this”, he mumbles irritably.

Silence follows his disgruntled admission.

“What am I lacking?”

“Why can’t I think of ideas that are entertaining and…”

Abruptly, his focus falls directly in my direction.

“Unique.”

He pushes himself up from his sunken position and strides to me.

I am then swiftly lifted and placed carefully on an elevated platform centered in the middle of the room, closer to the chair Chase occupied.

Before he drops into the chair again, he searches and finds a notebook and pencil.

Upon splitting open his tool that captivates his interest, he commences another session of absorption in the cold glow and soft clattering on the object.

But, something has changed.

A face bedraggled by glumness is now smiling.

Muted chuckles of euphoria wash away the bog of burden that he had been forcibly dredging through.

And momentary glances at my body, only amuse him further.

He occasionally sketches something on the notebook between the melodic clicking of his object, which is done with even more haste than before, as if racing toward a newfound ambition.

What is fueling this discovered crusade you are… chasing after, Chase.

And will you live to see your plot come to fruition?

Chase retreated to the room with Jackie after some time.

The rest of the night was uneventful as I waited for my captors, and my content, to awake.

As the fiery glow of Sol slowly softened the shadows of night, Jackie was the first to wake and make her way down the stairs, followed surprisingly by Chase, who sluggishly sauntered to convene with his lover.

“What were you doing up so late?” she inquires in a level murmur.

“Did you catch a second wind?”

“I actually did, though I’m going to pay for it today” he replies, fighting through a yawn.

“I’ll need coffee to carry me through the day.”

The dull clatter of metal and glass echo from below before Jackie says, “Well, coffee and breakfast should be ready any minute, so why don’t you go and wake up Haile, and I’ll dish out our plates.”

“Just what I need, babe”, emphasizing his need for sustenance.

“Thanks so much, and I’ll be back down in a sec with our girl.”

But as I hear Jackie and Chase’s kiss, I see the door to the adjacent room open.

Haile slowly steps from the room with another one of her stuffed creatures resembling a rose pink bear.

And then out of nowhere, I can feel it.

A rumbling begins.

Gradually, the vibration from within builds, and builds to a fitful jitter.

Any moment now.